Trailer
Plot summary
Demosthenes of Athens calls for war to hold off King Philip II of Macedon, who means to bring the Greek city-states under his rule. Olympias bears Philip a son, Alexander, and declares the boy the child of a god; Philip suspects she has been unfaithful, and General Parmenio advises him to raise the boy as his successor. Aristotle teaches Alexander at Mieza, where the prince says glory matters more to him than length of life. Philip makes him regent at Pella, then takes him on campaign, and after the victory at Chaeronea Alexander demands that the Greek cities never again bear arms against Pella and that they provide troops, arms and ships for a campaign against Persia. Philip divorces Olympias and marries Eurydice, leaving Alexander's succession in doubt.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Alexander the Great (1956)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The production built roughly 11,000 costumes and staged a battle sequence using 6,500 spears, 4,000 shields, 430 horses and 42 chariots, with 1,000 cavalry horses loaned by the Spanish military and Richard Burton's own costumes alone costing $87,500.
- Charlton Heston was offered the role of Alexander but turned it down, stating that “Alexander is the easiest kind of picture to make badly”.
- Actor Barry Jones turned down the role of Aristotle four separate times before finally accepting on the fifth offer, after negotiating his own salary for the part.
- To promote the film, United Artists dressed David Ballard, a man who stood seven feet seven inches tall, as Alexander for advertising appearances, part of a $1 million promotional campaign that included thirteen pages of ads in Life magazine.
- A production error in the film's opening titles rendered the movie's own name incorrectly, using the letter sigma in a way that spelled out 'Alsxander the Grsat' instead of the correct title.
- The film briefly became the highest-grossing movie in American theaters in April 1956, displacing Carousel for one week before falling back to second place behind it, and it ultimately ranked as the 32nd highest-grossing film of the year with $2.5 million earned by the end of 1956.
- Richard Burton had previously attempted to play Hephaestion in Terence Rattigan's Adventure Story, but was fired from that production before he took the title role in this film.
